News

Spotlight: MSgt. Tessa M. Fontaine

9/13/2013

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MSgt. Tessa M. Fontaine, a superintendent for counterintelligence and cyber inquiries in the National Reconnaissance Office's Counterintelligence Division in Chantilly, Va., is one of the Air Force's 12 Outstanding Airmen of the Year for 2013. Fontaine is a security forces craftsman who has served with the NRO since 2006 in a variety of positions, including personnel security special investigator and anti-terrorism/force protection officer. Her career has included deployments to Kuwait in 1998 and Iraq in 2005. She received the NRO Bronze Medal for her work on a joint espionage investigation. She also managed 14 investigators, closing 133 of 279 counterintelligence inquiries—an NRO record. Additionally, she created a spy brief for the US Attorney General; captured long-running Cuban spy activity and prepared the Director of National Intelligence brief; and led a national counterintelligence executive inquiry study, analyzing seven years of data. She also served as the president of the NRO's Joint Enlisted Top 3. Fontaine's home of record is Holyoke, Mass. The Daily Report is shining the spotlight on each OAY in the days leading up to AFA's Air & Space Conference that starts on Sept. 16 in National Harbor, Md. AFA will honor these airmen there. Also featured to date: